a blog that reminds you: just stay calm. no need to sparkle.

Adventures in Babysitting

Do you remember this movie? A babysitter and her two charges, a little girl and her middle-school-aged brother, plus the boy’s annoying friend, drive downtown, end up on the South Side of Chicago by accident and have ONLY THEIR WITS to get them back to safety. There are mishaps. The little girl at one point slides down the glass front of a skyscraper, for instance. Their car blows a tire. Someone gets stabbed on the el. They sing the blues in a club. They walk into a U of C frat party where the babysitter meets the love of her life. Belated spoiler alert.

All by accident. All fate handing them these bizarre-o twists. My sisters and I loved this movie. Like, psychotically loved it. In retrospect it’s a little weird with the whole white-kids-in-urbania thing, but at the time I wasn’t into racial politics, I just loved that it all turned out ok and they had just enough time to get home and pretend to be asleep before the parents returned.

I would like to propose that the Universe adopt a similar model. Present me with a series of quirky, fun, seemingly risky but ultimately safe learning experiences and drop me back home on the couch at the end. This whole “figure it out as you go” thing would be so much more reassuring that way.